Sarah Versus Words Unsaid
by Steampunk.Chuckster
Summary: Sarah's POV about the events of "Chuck Versus the Tooth". Definitely canon. A lot of soul-searching, regrets, and realizations.


**A/N: **And yet another filler fic! This time it takes place in "Chuck Versus the Tooth". Once again, this is Sarah's POV and it's canon. I _did_ however feel the need to mess with the timeline a bit with when Beckman grilled Casey and Sarah about Chuck decking Kwambe. It was better for my Sarah-feels-flow, as it were. So just warning you all. I did that on purpose. Sorry!

I edited this during a road trip TWICE OVER, but still no beta. Any mistakes are mine, _extra_ mine really, considering I edited it through twice. Uber ouch.

**Disclaimer: **While the mistakes may be mine, these characters and _Chuck_ are not. And it's a damn shame, too. Life, you guys.

ENJOY!

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Sarah's eyes were glued to the screen, and it seemed General Beckman's debriefing couldn't end fast enough for the CIA agent as she glanced to her left at the man she loved. She'd been trapped in her own head since the events of the night before.

And she hadn't really had a chance to talk to Chuck privately since then, as whatever drug Dr. Kwambe had pumped into his system knocked him out right after Merlin's proclamation of support. He didn't wake up again until just a few minutes before Beckman called for a debriefing.

"So…does this mean I have a clean bill of health?" She snapped back to attention at Chuck's words, fighting to keep her worry at bay and wanting very badly to take his hand again. But that was silly, ridiculous even. Sarah Walker, super spy as Chuck had called her many times, one of the top agents with the CIA, who'd taken out six armed men with nothing but her stiletto heels and survived six days alone in the Australian outback—seeking reassurance from her boyfriend's touch.

Any other day, she might scoff at herself, or be embarrassed, but at the moment she was much too distracted by her nerves. She watched Beckman closely, waiting for the woman's response. Luckily it came quickly.

"It would seem that way Chuck, but _I _can't actually clear you." Chuck immediately turned to look at Sarah and she looked back, smiling with the reassurance she'd nearly sought from him a moment earlier. But the woman's words struck a chord of fear in her. While it was highly possible Sarah was overreacting about a mere precaution, the last few days had left her incredibly unsettled, nervous, terrified…

"Well, then who can?" Chuck asked, his smile back on his face. It warmed her to know that he still looked to her for guidance in the spy world, even when he'd so far proven himself to be more than capable of holding his own. And all she'd had to do was give him a small smile and he was brimming with confidence, the worried frown gone from his handsome face.

"I'm sorry, Chuck, but we'll have to send you back to Dr. Dreyfus for one more session. I'm sure he'll find you're fine, but…" She tilted her head a bit with a shrug.

"No, of course. Of course, General. I understand."

Beckman signed off after a few words of congratulations and Chuck left to see the doctor.

Sarah had let him go with a wide smile on her face, accepting his kiss at the door, and watching him cross the courtyard before he disappeared. She understood he wanted to go now and get it out of the way so that he could stop being afraid that the Intersect was driving him mad.

But Sarah wasn't sure Dreyfus' clearance would be enough to rid her of the fear that someday, somehow, the Intersect would ruin Chuck's life again.

The last few days were a terror. She'd never felt so alone or helpless, even in the days when she'd thought Chuck was changing into the coldhearted spy she'd stopped being because of him. While she'd been hurt and filled with regret because of his un-Chuck-like behavior, at least the situation was under his control. Granted, she knew now that her Chuck had never left. He'd been there the whole time and she'd been too selfish to realize it.

Then Chuck began having nightmares shortly after she moved in. She thought there was nothing to worry about at first. It was a time of adjustment for both of them—neither having ever lived with a significant other before, or shared a bed every night with another person. The loss of absolute privacy at night was enough to make anyone lose sleep for a week or two after such a huge adjustment. But it became obvious to Sarah that the situation was more serious than that.

It was the first night of her second week living with him. She fell asleep nestled in his arms, her face tucked into his neck and her hands balled up on his chest. He woke her up when his body jolted in his sleep. A few desperate murmurs that she couldn't understand escaped from his lips and she pushed herself up to jostle him awake.

It had seemed logical at first that he'd be having nightmares. Chuck had seen terrible things, even been involved in terrible things, since Bryce first sent him that email more than three years ago. Even after the years of being a CIA agent in which she'd had ample time to get used to the traumatizing experiences that went hand in hand with her job, Sarah still had nightmares, sometimes about things that happened years and years earlier at the beginning of her career.

But Chuck's nightmares increased in intensity, and slowly began to increase in frequency as well. Within the last week, it seemed every time Chuck closed his eyes he had a nightmare and it began to worry her. So much so that she'd discussed it in private with Casey.

The NSA agent shrugged it off; stress, anxiety, boredom (she hadn't been amused at the way his eyebrow raised with innuendo at that one). Any number of things could have been the cause, but Casey had reassured her nonetheless.

Then she had been watching television with Chuck and he'd fallen asleep. She remembered being glad because it meant she could change the channel from _Spies Like Us_ to watch _Bridezillas_. She knew it was a ridiculous show, but it made her laugh to watch the maniacal bride tear everyone around her apart. And for what? A _wedding_? One day in her life? She'd turned off the television after the episode ended and let her eyes slip shut. A few minutes later, Chuck had shot up from her lap with a cry, and he'd rambled about his dream actually meaning something this time.

It scared her. Chuck wasn't just a spy, she knew, but the Intersect. When Chuck said his dream meant something, she trusted him and they immediately hurried across the courtyard to Casey's place. But when he'd started describing his dream to them—Shaw and the Zamibian food—she found herself wincing. Perhaps it had just been a nightmare after all.

And Casey pissed her off, ridiculing Chuck in front of Beckman and whining about his sleep, when she'd told him about Chuck barely sleeping anymore because of the constant nightmares. They were supposed to be a team, all _three_ of them, which meant backing each other up, not balking and letting off snide remarks when your partner voiced his concern. Granted, Chuck hadn't exactly flashed. But still…

So she'd stuck up for him but Beckman had been quick to interrupt, assign Chuck to see a therapist, and sign off. It had left Chuck disheartened to say the least, and it had left her still incredibly worried. It probably should have helped that neither Casey nor Beckman seemed too worried by Chuck's constant nightmares, but it didn't.

Something was wrong. Sarah could feel it. That very night while they'd lain in the dark beside one another, he stared at the ceiling for nearly two hours straight, his teeth working at his lip and his fingers tapping nervously on his chest. She'd pretended to be asleep but continued to watch him. He squinted his eyes as though in pain, blew air out of his mouth in a huff, and turned over. But not once did he fall asleep. She'd finally given in to her own fatigue and when she woke up the next morning, Chuck had already left, a sweet note on his pillow the only evidence that he'd been there at all.

When she'd come back from Castle to find Chuck home, she'd been incredibly relieved when he told her the therapist said he was fine. She'd been careful to guard her features, never once letting him know how worried she'd been.

But even then, the fear persisted. The Intersect hadn't been the cause this time, but the dangers of having something so inexhaustible in the human brain couldn't be very safe. She felt like an idiot for never thinking of it before. It wasn't just an emotional burden for Chuck, it was also a physical one and most importantly a mental one.

Then Chuck had punched Africa's leading-most scientist in the mouth in front of an opera house full of witnesses and he'd been forcibly dragged to the psych ward. No one had listened to her when she arrived there, having sped after them with Casey clinging to the passenger seat of her Porsche. She'd felt like a chicken with its head cut off, trying to appeal to the men in white, to the nurses, even the woman at the front desk. This was all a misunderstanding, she'd reassured them. Chuck didn't belong here. He'd made a mistake. He hadn't been sleeping well, if at all. The stress of his job had been getting to him. His father had disappeared again. Any number of things could have made him have…a bad day. It was just a bad day.

But the truth was that underneath her arguing with just about anyone who crossed her path in the ward, she realized it was only denial. It was so unlike him to snap like that, to hit Africa's most respected scientist in a public place, the way he was yelling about Ring intel in the man's tooth…None of it made sense. And it left her cold. Not quite as cold, though, as the guilt that swept over her when he'd been dragged away from her and Casey, struggling the whole way, and just before the door had shut, he'd yelled her name with such desperation and fear…

She bit her lip hard to think of it now as she crossed the courtyard into their apartment to wait for Chuck to return from what she hoped would be his last appointment with Dr. Dreyfus. What if Chuck went for his appointment and Dreyfus informed him that they'd have to keep him there, that he _was_ going mad, that they'd have to do studies to find out what was wrong?

Sarah knew she couldn't handle it again. She couldn't handle lying in their bed at night without him, while he slept in bleached white sheets, afraid that he was going mad, that he was alone in this. That night, Beckman had not only chewed her and Casey out, she'd also given her the worst news she'd ever received in her life.

She'd thought her worst fears had come true. The one thing she couldn't protect Chuck from was the Intersect. She didn't know how. She wasn't a scientist or a brain specialist. She wasn't Stephen J. Bartowski, the man who created the damned thing in the first place. She was Sarah Walker, agent of the CIA. And even though she was a damn good agent, maybe even the best, she would have no way to protect him from this. Bullets, yes. Kidnapping, yes. But not this.

"His mental deterioration may be…" Beckman paused, leaving time for Sarah to conclude a number of terrible things before she finished. "…unavoidable."

_Unavoidable. _That word stuck in her head, even now, because it was so accurately bleak. If the Intersect decided it wanted to take Chuck away from her for good, there would be nothing she could do to stop it. Mental deterioration. The first thing she'd thought of was his insatiable habit of inserting pop culture references wherever he could, even if he knew he'd be the only one who got it. And then she'd thought of how he knew almost by instinct where on her neck she liked to be kissed when she was upset, or how quickly he'd figured out the best way to get her to relax after a tough mission. Her sweet, brave (even when he didn't mean to be) Chuck. The same man who'd refused to kill the mole even when it meant he could have everything he'd ever wanted for himself, but didn't think twice about killing a turned agent when her life was on the line. The same man who'd willingly placed himself in an incredibly dangerous situation to help Jack Burton pull off the perfect con for no other reason than that he was Sarah's father.

The thought of losing him, of having everything that made him the best person she'd ever known slowly driven out of him by something his own father had built…

Sarah had spent that night wide awake, crying, tossing and turning, then crying again.

_Mental deterioration._

_Unavoidable._

_Worse than originally diagnosed._

_Unavoidable._

With her face buried in his pillow, the sheets thrown off of her bare legs as she felt herself sweating, Sarah had images of him alone in a room, being asked questions he couldn't answer because his brain was under an intense amount of pressure. He was definitely freaking out and she wasn't there to assure him that everything would be alright.

The most terrifying part had been the sincerity with which Beckman had relayed the news about Chuck's ailment. Her brow had been furrowed in concern, and her last words before cutting the feed: "Know that we will do everything possible for him. I care about him, too."

There wasn't much hope in the way she'd phrased it. She hadn't said, "He'll be fine, Agent Walker."

_Know that we will do everything possible for him._

_Mental deterioration is unavoidable._

As her tears started flooding the pillow, the sobbing began. The more she'd thought about Beckman's words, the more Sarah wondered if she was losing him. Her Chuck. Her nerdy gamer who'd been trying for the last three years to get her to play _Tomb Raider_ with him because "you're both super hot _and_ bad asses, although you take out terrorists and save lives instead of stealing priceless artifacts from caves and ancient temples, so…you win".

Everything had fallen down around her ears later the next day when she'd checked Kwambe's tooth back at Castle. Casey had gone along with her when she insisted on running a check on it like Chuck had asked her to, but she'd seen a tinge of reluctance in his face. She hadn't said anything but she'd been disappointed in the way he'd given up so easily on Chuck.

Granted, she was on the verge of giving up hope once the tests had come through and Chuck's theory was proven wrong. He'd decked an incredibly important man, very nearly started an international incident, seemingly for no reason other than a wild dream he'd had the night before.

When she'd called to tell him, the usual Chuck optimism was nonexistent in his voice. There was no "It's okay! Just don't lose hope!" or "We'll get through this! We'll find a way!" She heard only a monotoned "Thanks for trying." His voice was soft, disappointed, and resigned. It was his resignation that broke her heart so completely that she cut off the call as soon as possible. What could she say to him?

Nothing, really.

She ached terribly for the rest of the day, pacing Castle, ignoring Casey when he said he was heading home. And then she'd gotten into her Porsche and driven to her apartment, the home she shared with Chuck.

Everything had been exactly where it always was, Chuck's video game guitars propped against the wall next to the tv. If he never came home, what would she do with all of this?

She cursed herself for the supremely pessimistic thought. Chuck _was_ coming home.

She would bring him home.

And she wouldn't let this happen without getting to the bottom of it. She didn't even know exactly what the Intersect was doing to him. Was his head too crowded? Was the Intersect gnawing at his brain, causing his personality and knowledge to be pushed out in favor of the government's secrets?

Sarah had changed her clothes and, despite the late hour, she'd rushed to Dreyfus' home. It was definitely an intrusion on his personal boundary, a breach of protocol…but wasn't Chuck worth it?

She loved him so unconditionally, so deeply, that as she walked up the path to the weirdly normal house, she was adamant that Chuck was worth anything and everything…_always_.

Now Sarah Walker paced her apartment, doing silly things like drying the silverware she took out of the dishwasher with a towel before putting it away, or rearranging the mugs in the cupboard, tossing out rotten vegetables from the crisper in the fridge, wringing her hands and leaning against the couch, watching tv…Until she finally settled on grabbing her laptop to check her email.

In spite of it being on her lap, opened to her email account, the bold unread messages glaring at her, her mind wandered back to the scene last night at Dreyfus' home. She'd never felt so desperate as she did then, knowing that at any moment he could close the door on her and all hope for helping Chuck would disappear.

She didn't fight the quiver in her voice, or the way her heart kept leaping into her throat as she tried to express herself to the seemingly attentive therapist. Never had she allowed herself to be so vulnerable, so pitifully desperate, but she didn't care. This was about Chuck. She needed him to be okay, and she said as much. The words had tumbled out of her, and she'd begged him, her voice scratchy, her eyes misting as her brain wandered to the consequences of this not working. She needed Chuck Bartowski exactly as he was.

"Please…" She'd paused, so many things happening in her head at once. She saw Chuck as he was a week before when she'd walked in the front door one early evening. He'd been in a robe that hung open, revealing that he wore nothing but boxers and a pair of tube socks. And he was dancing rather erratically to some fast-paced record from the1960s it sounded like, the _Guitar Hero _controller clutched in his hands. She'd watched for a moment until he spun around and saw her standing there, her lips pursed and her eyebrow raised. He'd been incredibly embarrassed, almost scratching the record as he tore it off the player, trying to play it off by inviting her to join him, but only after he'd already stopped the music. She'd never laughed so hard in her life and she felt bad afterwards because he really had been mortified about it and a little quiet for a few minutes. She'd made it up to him later that night, more than once.

_Mental deterioration. _

She'd pictured him in his robe, boxers, and socks, stomping around the living room, climbing onto the couch cushions and leaping off of them…and then she'd pictured him like she'd seen the other patients earlier that day when she and Casey had visited—hunched in a chair, twitching, or walking around the room mumbling nonsense.

Sarah knew what she needed to say, and she put every ounce of her soul into it.

"I love him."

"Ever tell him that?"

That had given her pause, but she pushed that to the back of her mind for the moment and stayed with her mission. "Please, doctor, I am _begging_ you." Her voice was husky, unshed tears evident as her throat threatened to close. She couldn't do this much longer without crying. The memories of Chuck, the safe feeling of him wrapped around her, the happy bounce in his step when he came around the desk to meet her when she visited him at the Buy More after he'd had a long day of Jeffster and angry customers, the way he opened himself to her from the very beginning, trusting her with not only his physical self but his _everything_.

"You're not the only one."

She'd been confused, but wasn't allowed much time to consider his words when Casey stepped out from behind the door. Sarah met Casey's tiny smile with one of her own, her heart brimming with some emotion she couldn't exactly place. She'd underestimated him, not given him enough credit. She'd forgotten how loyal he was to Chuck…how easily Chuck had pulled both her and Casey in with his inherent goodness. She'd thought Casey had given up on his team…on his partner…but of course he hadn't. How could he?

This was Chuck.

He was important to both of them. _So very important._

Sarah's eyes wandered up from the laptop screen.

_Ever tell him that?_

_No. No I haven't_, she realized suddenly. She actually hadn't said it in those words. And so many things suddenly came rushing abruptly back to her. Missed opportunities when she'd taken his hand or stroked his cheek, or even kissed him…but none of those times did she respond. And he'd expected it, hadn't he? He'd yearned to hear her say it back.

But he must have known! She proved it to him every day! Or at least, she tried to.

But knowing wasn't the same as hearing it.

It was almost like knowing the capital of Uzbekistan was Tashkent, but needing to check the map to confirm it anyway. It doesn't matter that you know, you still feel safer when you have validation.

And how had Dreyfus known? Of course. Chuck had talked about it, talked about _her_. She knew him well. He must have decided ahead of time that he wouldn't let their relationship become fodder for the therapist to pick at, so he wouldn't mention Sarah at all. And then he'd lain on the couch, was manipulated into saying how great their relationship was, and then somehow began rambling about his feelings, as he always did. Of course, the fact that she hadn't said "I love you" yet was eating away at him.

It all made so much terrible sense now.

He'd neglected to tell her the truth about Dreyfus' diagnosis. He'd told her he was fine, when in actuality, there was a chance his sanity was slowly melting away. Of course he wouldn't have told her. He was Chuck. He was selfless to a fault and he didn't want her to worry about him. But what if that wasn't the only reason? What if her own hang-ups expressing intense emotion had given him doubts about whether she would stay if he began to lose his mind? He was afraid she'd leave him if he wasn't whole, if he wasn't the Chuck she'd fallen for anymore.

And she couldn't blame him. Unshed tears sat in her blue-grey eyes as her words all those months ago came back to her. _You're not the same guy that I fell for. _Of course he thought she'd leave if he changed because she almost had. But that had been different! Even if Chuck _had _killed the mole, it would have been his decision, his choice.

This stripped him of control, of making any kind of decision. None of this was his fault. There was nothing he could do about it. He hadn't asked for the Intersect to fry his brain, he hadn't asked for the headaches she caught him suffering through when he didn't think she was watching, and he hadn't asked for the nightmares.

She would _never _leave him, no matter what happened.

A tear escaped and rolled down her cheek. She swiped at it, pressing her lips together. Sarah cared for Chuck more than she'd ever cared about anything or anyone ever in her life. There wasn't anything in this world that would take her away from him again. This would not beat them.

She'd been rather hurt when Chuck had leaned over the table in the rec room at the hospital, his lovable brown eyes pleading above a worried smile making her chest physically ache as she met his gaze. _Sarah? You can't give up on me, okay?_

That fact that he'd been worried about that had been only a passing concern for her at that moment, because she'd been eager to assure him, stepping easily into the role she'd acquired on the first day they'd met—the bolsterer of his confidence. Thinking back on it now, though, the fact that he feared she might even _consider _leaving him set her on edge.

And then when she'd seen him on the ground after taking Kwambe and his men out, his eyes unfocused and his limbs splayed on the linoleum, her blood ran cold and she fell to the ground beside him. Had he been shot? Stabbed? Poisoned?

She'd sighed in utter relief at finding his eyes focused on her, and she did a quick check to make sure there were no wounds.

_You came back for me_, he'd breathed in awe.

He must have spent the hours after their phone call wondering if he would ever see her again, wondering if she'd hopped a plane to DC to await her next assignment. No, he couldn't possibly think that of her. But it wouldn't have been a stretch for him to think she'd given up hope, that she'd resigned herself to the fact that Chuck Bartowski was a nut job now.

This pained her like nothing in her life ever had. She placed herself in his shoes. She would have wondered if she really _was _going crazy. And she would have been heartbroken, afraid that the person she loved most in the world would follow if her sanity left her.

_Oh, Chuck._

Where was he? Why was the session with Dr. Dreyfus taking so damn long?

There were too many times he'd warmly professed his love and she'd neglected to say it back. There was two nights ago on the couch during _Spies Like Us. _Then another time when they'd been waiting under the awning of a knick-knack shop for the abrupt rainstorm to die down. Sarah'd made fun of him for not wanting to run to the car in the rain. He'd groused, "Yeah. _You_ can say that 'cause we didn't drive the Porsche." But she'd run out into the downpour without him and let it soak through her clothes, grinning happily at him and reaching out both hands for him to join her. He'd smiled softly and said "I love you" to which she replied wordlessly, running to him and leaping into his arms, her legs wrapping around his waist and her lips attacking his. Then there was the time he'd come down with a cold and she brought him a mug of hot lemon with honey stirred in it. He'd said "I love you" in his aching, raspy voice, and she'd merely stroked his curls back from his feverish forehead.

Each and every time, her heart had beat wildly against her ribcage, her fingers and toes had tingled, and she'd wanted to lose herself in him. But she hadn't told him about the way he made her feel. She'd never told him how much she liked the softness of his voice when he said it, or how he'd emphasize _love_ nearly every time, making it sound so incredibly passionate and beautiful—almost like he couldn't stand _not _telling her.

The power with which she responded to his proclamations of love _every single time_, the intensity of the feeling, the purity of her bliss—didn't he deserve all of that too? Didn't he deserve to hear those words?

Why had she denied him this for so long when she loved him so ardently and with every bit of her mind, body, and soul? As corny as it sounded, it was the truest thing in her life.

And why had she told _Chuck's therapist _about her love for her boyfriend, her soul mate, before she'd told _him_? What a freaking shitty girlfriend she'd been! She had an empty email opened on her laptop and she clicked on the blank box. She typed "You suck" then deleted it.

Then she typed "I love Chuck Bartowski." Then she pressed enter and typed it again. And again. And again. Then just "I love Chuck. I love him. I love him with everything in me. I love you, Chuck."

She deleted it all with a smile growing on her face and looked up as Chuck burst into the apartment, dropping his keys on the table.

"Hey, Sarah, hey. We need to talk."

She put the computer down on the couch cushions beside her and watched as he strode purposefully into the room towards her. "Sure, Chuck. But—"

"No, look, this is very important."

She jumped to her feet in front of him. "I love you." He stopped, his face taking on that look she adored, when he was bowled over by surprise or awe, when she did something that left him speechless. "It shouldn't have taken me this long to say it but I've never felt this way." She grabbed his hands in hers, looking directly into his eyes. "Before you, the only future I could think about was my next mission, and now…" She didn't hesitate but a moment before saying what she'd never thought she'd ever say to anyone. "…all I can think about is a future with you."

Sarah took a deep breath and squeezed his fingers, smiling.

"I love you, Chuck." And she'd say it at least once a day from now on.

His handsome features melted into the supremely happy smile he saved just for her, a relieved laugh accompanying it, and he shook his head a bit. "I love you, too."

Sarah Walker grinned, feeling like she might burst, and ignoring the fact that she'd never quite felt an emotion this powerful before Chuck Bartowski. She closed the distance, pressing her lips lovingly to his. She reached up and cupped his smooth cheeks lightly with her palms, stroking his jaw with her fingers, as she always did when she was feeling particularly tender.

She reveled in the way he licked his lips after they pulled away, then remembered why he'd been gone in the first place. "So…what did you wanna tell me? Is it about the doctor? What did he say?" She schooled her features showing calm happiness in her expectant gaze.

"He said that…I'm…fine." Chuck pressed his lips together and shook his head a bit tiredly. Relief flooded through her, and she accepted his answer and grinned again. For now, she'd push her worries of what the Intersect was capable of doing to him in the future to the back of her mind and instead enjoy being with him now, while he was in her arms and looking at her in the way he was. "So…" he drew out.

She reached up again and set her fingers to frame his face, kissing him lightly. Wrapping her arms tightly around his shoulders, and lifting herself onto her tiptoes, she took an absurd amount of comfort from the feeling of his strong arms engulfing her torso in their loving warmth. Her eyes slipped shut of their own accord and her lips stretched into a supremely happy smile.

This really was worth everything, anything…_always_.

* * *

**A/N:** Well, that just happened. It did. And I hope what you just read prompted so much excitement that you'll send me a review! So far I've enjoyed every review I've received! Thank you! To those who haven't signed into ff accounts and are leaving guest reviews, you guys are killer awesome as well! Wish I could send you personal messages, but I can't. So here! Have some public love!

That sounded innuendo-y. So I'll leave you all there.

Oh! But wait! Just so you all know, when I pictured Chuck dancing in his skivvies to a record, the music I heard was "Good Lovin'" by the Young Rascals. That should help with the image.

Ta!


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